Enlarge ImageRequest to buy this photoAP file photoAs an astronaut and aquanaut who lived underwater for the U.S. Navy, Scott Carpenter was the first man to explore both the depths of the ocean and the heights of space.

Astronaut Scott Carpenter, the second American to orbit the Earth and first person to explore
both the heights of space and depths of the ocean died today after a stroke. He was 88.

Along with John Glenn, who flew three months before him, Carpenter was one of the last two
surviving original Mercury 7 astronauts for the fledgling U.S. space program.

His wife, Patty Barrett, said Carpenter died of complications from a September stroke in a
Denver hospice. He lived in Vail, Colo.

"We're going to miss him," she said.

At a time when astronauts achieved fame on par with rock stars, folks across the country sat
glued to their TV screens, anxiously awaiting the outcome of Carpenter's 1962 ride. He overshot his
landing by 288 miles, giving NASA and the nation an hour-long scare that he might not have made it
back alive.

The fallout from that missed landing was a factor that kept NASA from launching Carpenter
into space again. So he went from astronaut to "aquanaut" and lived at length on the sea floor -
the only man to ever formally explore the two frontiers.

The launch into space was nerve-racking for the Navy pilot on the morning of May 24, 1962.

"You're looking out at a totally black sky, seeing an altimeter reading of 90,000 feet and
realize you are going straight up. And the thought crossed my mind: What am I doing?" Carpenter
said 49 years later in a joint lecture with Glenn at the Smithsonian Institution.

For Carpenter, the momentary fear was worth it, he said in 2011: "The view of Mother Earth
and the weightlessness is an addictive combination of senses."